


The Journey North

by wingthing



Series: The EQ Alternaverse [23]
Category: Elfquest
Genre: EQ Alternaverse, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-31
Updated: 2015-08-31
Packaged: 2018-04-18 06:20:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4695404
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wingthing/pseuds/wingthing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A young Islander named Savin leaves the safety of Green Moon Bay to find the source of a mysterious cry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Journey North

Savin was dozing when it happened. It was a lazy afternoon in Green Moon Bay, and even the most dedicated fisher had abandoned his nets and sought out a patch of shade. Savin’s little hut faced the north-westerly breeze, and she lay in her woven hammock, her eyes closed, her face tipped to the sun. 

Then it struck, without warning. A psychic cry, borne on the wind. 

** Friends! We’ve... where are you? Where? Need.... aid... come! Where are...? Answer! Answer!** 

Savin nearly fell out of her hammock. She scrambled to her feet as the cry repeated itself in her mind. 

_Need... aid..._

_Where are you?_

_Answer! Answer!_

It was broken, distorted in a way all sendings were when stretched to the very limits of telepathy’s power. But she felt the pain and longing in the words. Somewhere elves were crying out for help. 

She already knew, somehow, that this was no cry for aid from the Southern Coves or Farthest Isle. 

The cry came with the breeze... from the north. 

They were not Islanders who begged for help. 

They were... other elves. 

* * * 

The entire population of Green Moon Bay assembled in the sandy plot of bare earth that had always served as the center of town. Their leader, Evergreen, climbed up onto the roof of their wooden tavern to better address the mob of a hundred-odd frantic elves. 

“We all heard the cry for help –” she began. But the voices of mob silenced her. 

“Damn right we did.” “Who are these elves?” “Not Islanders, that’s for sure!” “There are no other elves. Not here.” “High Ones – does the cry come from the Farland?” 

“Enough!” Evergreen shouted. “We won’t get anywhere squawking like gulls. No, these aren’t Islanders who called to us. The sending was off... the words had an accent unlike any from here to Farthest Isle. But it doesn’t come from the Farland – that’s plain enough. The cry came from the north!” 

“There’s nothing north but humans and trolls and wilderness!” someone shouted. 

“And elves, it seems. Maybe our distant kin. Maybe the descendants of some seafarers who went journeying and never came back.” 

From her place on the edge of the crowd, Savin nodded at the wisdom of her sister’s words. Yes... that was the most logical answer. Wanderlust was bred into the bones of all seafaring elves. Hundreds had scattered on the waves in the generations since their ancestors founded Green Moon Bay. 

Hundreds... their own father among them. 

Savin pushed the thought away. No. No, their father was dead. 

She climbed up the branch of a nearby tree, to get a better view of the assembly. Elves were shouting out countless questions and demands, and Evergreen was once again ordering calm. 

“Eastwaker,” Savin heard someone mutter. 

So... their former leader was in everyone’s thoughts. How long had it been since he disappeared? A century at least. Savin had kept careful track of the days at first, when she still hoped he would one day return from his quest. But the counting had grown too painful after the first few years, and she had stopped. 

“The cry came from the north,” Evergreen repeated, louder. “Well beyond normal sending range. You all heard the distortion in the words. I daresay they’ve got some kind of magic to send so far.” 

“We have to find them!” someone towards the front of the mob snapped. 

“Of course we do!” Evergreen snapped back. “You think we’re going to just sit here and ignore a cry from our kin? We’ll send someone straight away.” 

“I’ll go!” Loosestrife announced. Savin’s head snapped around as her brother scrambled up onto the roof of the tavern. “As captain–” 

“Your place is here!” Evergreen cut him off. “What – are you going to take the _Lady Mura_ out into the deep water beyond the Great Spur? We can’t risk our only ship on the open water. You have a trade route to think of. The humans and trolls are waiting for you in another month’s time!” 

“Um...” Loosestrife rolled his shoulders. “Well, then I’ll take something smaller. Let Goldcinder captain the _Mura_.....” But his enthusiasm was already fading. Evergreen quickly cooled him down. 

“You always wanted to captain the _Mura_. You can’t just abandon her to play at questings.” 

Loosestrife grumbled under his breath at the public dressing down. But he followed his elder sister’s lead in all things, and he made no further protests.   
“I’ll go!” Savin called from the tree branch she was perched on. 

All heads turned towards Eastwaker’s youngest child. Savin drew herself tall. “I know how to survive off the land as well as the sea,” she said defensively, anticipating a challenge from a more seasoned explorer. “And if it’s healing they need–” 

“No one’s better at herblore than you, sister,” Evergreen said. “It’s decided. Savin will go.” 

Their leader’s words settled matters. The mob slowly dispersed. There was no further debate, no opposition. Islanders did not waste time at debate when there was work to be done. 

* * * 

“Are you sure about this, Savin?” Loosestrife fretted as Savin planned out her route in Evergreen’s house. A worn parchment map of the mainland coast lay on the wooden table, and Savin was carefully measuring days’ worth of travel. 

“I’m sure,” she said, and it was not bravado talking. No, something had gripped her, compelled her to take this plunge. It had been many years since she had made more than a seven-day journey to Shark Cove alone. But the cry lingered in her mind, urging her on. She knew somehow that this was her journey to make, and no one else’s. 

“The _Mura_ will take you as far as she can.” Loosestrife traced a line on the map. “We can head inland here at the mouth of the Green River. Sail upriver as far as it will let us. Save you a good month on your journey.” 

“Thanks, ‘Strife.” She looked down at the map again. “From there... I should be able to take a canoe up the rest of the river, up....” she traced a line high into the Great Spur peninsula and into the unknown land further north. 

“How will you know where the elves are?” Loosestrife asked. 

“The cry will tell me.” Savin touched her temple lightly. “It’s in my mind, scratching like nothing else. I won’t need a compass to keep me on track.” 

“You’re looking kinda pale, little sister.” 

Savin summoned a brave smile. “Nerves, I guess.” 

**It’s not too late to change your mind, Savin,** Evergreen sent kindly. 

**I can do this,** Savin sent back. She met her half-sister’s eyes across the table. **Don’t worry about me.** 

* * *

Seven days after the cry first touched their minds, Savin was ready to sail. Her little canoe and her sack of provisions were loaded aboard the three-masted ship docked in the harbour of Green Moon Bay. Most of the town had come out to wish her well. But now the tide was turning, and it was time for final goodbyes. 

“Take care,” Gullwing hugged her daughter tightly and kissed her cheek. “The Bay won’t be the same without you.” 

“I’ll be back before you know it,” Savin choked back her tears. “What’s a year or two to us?” 

Gullwing’s face fell, and Savin felt a sharp stab of pain. Hadn’t that been almost exactly what Eastwaker had said when he had bid child and one-time Recognized goodbye? 

Savin had no words, so she hugged her mother again. “I will be back!” she insisted. 

Gullwing swallowed her own tears and took Savin’s face in her hands. “Who knows? Maybe you’ll find some sign of him on your journey.” 

“Maybe,” Savin whispered. And she embraced Gullwing tightly, hoping her mother wouldn’t see the sorrow in her face. Gullwing had never given up hope of seeing her old friend again. 

“Tide’s starting turn,” Loosestrife called from the gangplank. “Let’s go, Freckles!” 

Savin reluctantly released her mother and followed her half-brother up the gangplank. “I’ll be thinking of all of you!” she called. “And I’ll return with news of our kin.” 

* * * 

“Day six,” Savin murmured to herself as she climbed up on the deck of the Lady Mura. The sailing ship had reached the mouth of the Green River and was slowly turning up against the gentle current. Mangrove swamps lined the riverbanks. The waters were slowly receeding from the summer monsoons that flooded the mainland while leaving the Islands relatively dry. 

“Heavy current,” Loosestrife grumbled. “It’ll be slow going. But you’re in luck, little sister. The floods means we can get further up the river before we scrape bottom.” 

Savin smiled. 

“So what do you think you’ll find up there?” Loosestrife asked. 

“Oh... I don’t know. A little camp... maybe ten or twenty elves huddled under a few shelters. Descendants of some five or six travellers who disappeared a thousand years back. Dying... maybe a flood or some disaster... or maybe just dying of hopelessness... wandering alone. Maybe... they remember us at Green Moon Bay, but only barely. They can’t remember how to come home, but they know we’re out there somewhere, so they’re calling for us.” 

“Whew. That cry really got to you, didn’t it?” 

“How could it not? Didn’t it get to you? Didn’t it... get its hooks into your skull and refuse to shake loose? That’s what I feel.” 

“Well...” Loosestrife bit his lip. “You be careful, huh? And if a year passes and you can’t find anything, you should turn around and come home. I don’t want you to forget how to come home!” 

“You’re thinking about him too, aren’t you?” 

Loosestrife shrugged. “Can’t really help it, can you?” 

Savin averted her eyes. “I won’t find him out there, you know.” 

“I know,” Loosestrife nodded. “Let’s... not talk about it, all right. Father... he’d want us to remember all the good times.” He chuckled. “Remember that time he and I plunked you down in your first little outrigger?” 

Savin’s eyes narrowed. “Yes... I remember. You promised you wouldn’t flip me over.” 

“Hey – every pip has to learn how not to panic when you get flipped.” 

“You could have warned me!” 

“Aw, you did all right,” Loosestrife laughed. “You were always a much better swimmer than I was as a baby.” 

Savin laced her arm through his. “I’m gonna miss you, ‘Strife.” 

He hugged her tight. “You take care of yourself, Freckles. I don’t give a damn about any lost kindred of ours. I just want you to be around when Gale writes your story down.” 

* * * 

“Well... we got you farther than I would have thought,” Goldcinder announced as he stared down at the churning green water of the flooded river. The _Lady Mura_ was sitting very low in the water, and occasionally her keel brushed against the soft mud underneath. 

“Still... seems like a pretty primitive place to dump my baby sister,” Loosestrife grumbled. 

They lowered Savin’s little dugout canoe and set it in the river. Savin dropped her bag of supplies into the canoe, then climbed down herself. A final round of farewells, and Savin pushed off from the side of the three-masted ship. 

“If you’re not back in two years we’re coming after you!” Loosestrife shouted on the wind as Savin’s paddling slowly took her upriver. The crew of the Lady Mura waited until she was out of sight before they slowly turned the ship around and set a course back for the sea. 

* * * 

_Where are you? We need aid. Where are you?_

Savin awoke just before dawn, the psychic cry ringing in her head. “Well... day thirty-two,” she murmured to herself. “Business as pokin’ usual.” 

The cry haunted her sleep. In her good dreams, she arrived to save her lost kin. In her nightmares she wandered in the darkness, unable to find them. 

She got to her feet. She had camped in a little grove by the high water line – or what had been the high water line the night before. By dawn’s light, she saw that the water line had dropped nearly a foot. The Dry was coming swiftly to the rainforest this year. She took it as a good omen. 

She pulled out her metal fishhook and line, and dropped it in the river for breakfast. A few moments later she pulled out a lazy catfish. She fileted it and cooked it over a little fire lit from her tinderbox. Well-fed and confident in her ability to survive on her wits, she rescued her canoe from where the receding floodwaters had marooned it. 

“Not too shabby, Nimh,” she murmured. “Not too shabby at all.” 

Speaking her soulname aloud seemed to give her renewed strength, and she set out full of hope. Perhaps she would make a full three leagues before dusk. 

“Hang on, pips, Savin’s coming,” she chuckled. 

* * * 

“Day fifty-six. Still in the pokin’ rainforest.” Savin moaned as she rolled over onto her back. She had not slept all night. Buzzing insects attracted by the rotting wood and plants exposed by the receding flood had tormented her in the dark, and her leg burned from a yellowjacket sting. She was drenched in sweat. As she had expected, it was even hotter in the rainforest than at the Bay, and she felt dangerously dehydrated after sweating all night. She filled her waterskin with river water filtered through linen, drained it in several gulps, then refilled it. 

She got to her feet and paced, trying to ease the pains in her limbs. Her shoulders ached from paddling, and the muscles in her left leg were painfully inflamed. 

“And you’re not going anywhere today, girl,” she sighed. 

She lay back down on the ground. At length exhaustion won out, and she fell asleep. It was mid-afternoon when she awoke. A few gulps of water and a generous helping of raw fish later, she decided it was time to move. 

“I hate this place,” she growled. Then she shook her head. “No... nope. No point complaining about what you can’t change, Savin-girl. Just... just dig deep,” she swore as she forced her to dip her paddle in again and again. “Just dig deep...” 

She travelled ever northward, sometimes straining against as sharp current as the river narrowed and the floodwater rushed out towards the now-distant sea. At times she paddled to the continuous din of rainforest beasts – howling monkeys, screeching birds. At times the jungle was oddly silent, and Savin took to talking to herself to fill the emptiness. 

“I think I may be going a little mad,” she remarked casually one afternoon. “I never really realized how... strange it is to be completely alone. And I don’t think I’m the best company.” 

She laughed then – laughed loudly at her own poor jest because she was the only one who would ever hear it. 

* * * 

_Where are you? We need aid._

_Friends... where are you?_

_Where are you, Savin?_

Savin awoke with a start. Never had the elves in her dreams called her by name before. She slowly sat up. It was late afternoon, and she had stopped to nap. After a month on the Green River, the floodwaters were almost gone, and the river itself was growing quite shallow in places. At times she could see the bottom through the glass-green surface. It would not be too much longer before she would need to find a new river for her little canoe. 

“Nnnuh...” Savin rubbed her forehead. “Get out of my head, whatever you are.” 

_Where are you, Savin?_ the voices lingered, pleading. Strange, it seemed like she could hear one voice calling louder than the others. Or was it only her imagination? 

“Day sixty-two, and I’m completely insane,” Savin laughed as she got to her feet. “All right, Savin-girl. Time for something to eat.” 

She pulled out her fishing gear and dropped a line into the water. A fish was soon cooking over the fire while another waited its turn. 

“I think it was a lad’s voice I heard,” Savin remarked to the filleted fish. “I guess I’ve gone too long without a good tumble, huh? Naw... I’m not Loosestrife, after all.” She chuckled. “Well, your friend’s almost finished, then it’s your turn. I hope you’ll taste as good as this one smells.” 

The nights were getting cooler now. She figured she had passed that imaginary line where things simply could not get any hotter, and the world was forced to grow cooler instead. The noon-point of earth, their legends called it. 

According to their history, they had once come from a distant land high above the noon-point of the earth – a land where the winters were cold enough to turn water solid – before Mura the High One had led them into the eternal sun. 

Water as hard as rock. She didn’t believe it. It was a tall tale for cubs, like the maraeva monsters of the deep water. 

Yet part of her rather hoped her quest might just take her north enough to see frozen water. 

The rainforest began to break up, give way to great fields of grass and solitary trees. She came upon signs of humans along the riverbank – burnt out campfires and abandoned shelters that lacked the finesse of an elfin touch. She took to travelling at night to avoid being seen – so far north of Green Moon Bay, humans might be less well-disposed to “spirits.” 

One morning she was awakened from her morning sleep by the harsh calls of human males. Curiosity got the better of her and she crawled through the heavy reeds that lined the riverbank. The humans were hunting waterfowl from a bark canoe in the river. These were not the humans of Crest Point, but they seemed to have a similar level of skill in the hunt. 

A whistle startled her. A well-aimed arrow killed a large swan less than a few paces from her hiding place. 

Not one to decline a gift, Savin darted out and caught up the bird. She was back under the cover of the tall reeds before the humans landed on the shore to retrieve the catch. 

“Where?” one of them shouted. Their language was not greatly different from that of the Crest Point tribes. 

“A cat must have taken it...” 

“A cat with a child’s footprint?” another pointed in the mud. 

“Oh, spirits save us, it has only four toes!” 

“We’re in spirit lands. Come on, let get out of here!” 

“Where’s my kill?” 

“Forget your kill! Do you want to offend the spirits?” 

Savin clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle a laugh as the three humans scrambled back into their canoe and paddled away as fast as they could. Gullible little monkeys the world over, she thought to herself. Some things never changed. 

* * * 

“Day seventy-five and I’ve run out of water,” Savin sighed miserably. The great Green River had shrunk to a rapids-laced stream, too shallow and treacherous to be navigated. After three days of failed portages, Savin had decided to concede defeat. She took out her dagger and carved _The Baby Mura_ in the side of abandoned dugout. “There you are. Maybe a human will find you and invent a writing system. Naw... more likely you’ll be kindling one day. No hard feelings.” 

She continued on foot. Within another three days she learned to regret abandoning her canoe. It was hard trekking through the jungle. The month spent in her canoe she had largely gone barefoot, her black boots idling in her rucksack. Waterlogged feet were a condition she was used to, but not blisters from long hikes. 

“Ohhh, my feet are crab meat, I think,” she groaned, when she had to stop to slide off her boots and massage her feet again. She was keeping a close watch on a suspicious set of fluid-filled blisters on her heel. “Whoever you are, elves, you had better be worth it.” 

She rummaged through her bag, looking for something with which to bind her heels. Inside was a pair of sturdy pants, her embossed leather belt, a fur blanket for cold nights, a clean cotton shirt, and some all-purpose leather thongs. 

“Well, can’t cut up the shirt – I might need it sooner than I think.” She looked down at the bandeau of cotton she wore about her breasts. “Yep... sooner than I think.” She slipped off the bandeau and tore it into four long strips. Two she used on her feet, and the other two she stuffed deep into her bag. She donned her white shirt and tied up her auburn hair with a leather thong. The back of her neck was drenched with sweat. 

“Nope... won’t be seeing solid water any time soon.” 

* * * 

The nights grew even cooler, and a heavy dew covered her limbs as she slept. Her short skirt was stuffed into the rucksack, and she donned her leather trousers to keep her legs warm. The rainforest fell behind her, and coastal forest waited ahead. The ground was rocky and uneven, and the lesion on her left heel was constantly inflamed from rubbing against her boot. Her dreams grew darker, as the voices called for aid in vain. 

One voice led the chorus now, a soft male tenor. Was it her father? No, surely not. But then again, she found she was having trouble remembering his voice. 

It rained every day now. Humid winds swept the coast, and thunderstorms gathered every afternoon. She couldn’t understand it. It was winter in Green Moon Bay now. Yet it seemed to be summer here. Her feet suffered from days spent hiking in water-logged boots. 

“Hate this... hate this,” she growled to herself one night as she struggled to build a fire. “What I wouldn’t give to be home. If Loosestrife were here we’d be telling jokes all night long to keep the rain at bay. Oh... Skelter must have had his birthday by now – two eights and finally allowed to sail with the Mura. Seems just yesterday Evergreen and Gale Recognized. And here I promised I’d sail with him on his maiden voyage. Some aunt I’m turning out to be, eh?” she addressed the fire. 

The dying flames crackles and hissed as the rain threatened to drown them. A noxious smoke rose up from the wet wood. Savin coughed furiously. 

“It’ll all be worth it,” she moaned. “Just keep thinking about those elves...” 

_Where are you, Savin?_

“I’m coming, I’m coming...” she whispered as she fell asleep, miserable under a shelter of branches. “I’ll find you. Just wait for me...” 

* * * 

She reckoned it had been a hundred days since leaving the Bay when the fever began to build in her blood. The lesion on her heel had become infected. The mold and fungus of the coast forest had poisoned the raw skin. 

She abandoned her daily march and spent the day hunting for herbs and roots. But the plants were all different now and she didn’t recognize any of the familiar healing leaves or roots that she had always relied on. 

At least the rains had stopped. And for some reason the days were growing ever longer. At Green Moon Bay the sun rose and set at almost the same time throughout the year. But now it seemed that the wet and humid season signalled longer days and shorter nights. Her aching bones were glad for the extra sun. 

* * * 

By the hundred-and-seventh day since her journey began Savin was unable to move. She could only crawl into the domed wigwam she had erected in the shadow of a tree and try to keep warm. She was freezing and sweating at once. Fever dreams plagued her – voices whispered in her ears and lights flashed under her closed eyelids. 

_Where are you, Savin?_

“I’m coming...” she whispered weakly. “I’ll be there soon...” 

_I need you, Nimh..._

“I’m almost there...” 

_I’m worried about you, Freckles._

“Shut up, ‘Strife...” 

_Savin? Savin, is that you? My little Savin-girl?_

No... no, not Eastwaker’s voice. She clapped her hands over her ears. 

_Where are you, Savin?_

“Go away... please,” she moaned. “I can’t see you.” 

_I’ve missed you._

“No... no. Can’t see you. Can’t hear you. You’re dead and I can’t hear the dead.” 

_I’m waiting... answer me, daughter._

“No,” she sobbed. “No, Father. I can’t. It would... oh... such a foolish way to die... a broken blister. If I were home...” 

_Come home, Savin..._

“No! No, I won’t! I can’t! I can’t follow you, Father!” she beat her head against her rucksack bundled as a pillow. “I can’t die. They’re waiting for me... living elves. He’s... he’s waiting...” 

The voices in her head seemed to retreat. Savin collapsed against her bedding, too tired to fight her exhaustion. 

So this is it... she thought. This is how it ends... all alone... 

But she did not die. And when she awoke, an eternity later, the pain in her head had evaporated. 

* * * 

“Day one-hundred-and-twenty,” Savin announced jauntily as she loaded up her supplies. “Or day one-hundred-and-twenty-five, maybe. Who knows? Who cares?” 

The fever had robbed her of valuable time. But she felt reinvigorated now. 

I’m coming, she thought. I’ll find you yet. 

The elves of the cry had all crystallized into one single soul, a handsome lad with bright eyes who haunted her dreams in a most... pleasant way. She could never quite make out his face, never quite touch him. But his voice urged her on, and in her dreams she knew he was waiting for her just beyond the horizon. 

“I’m going balmy,” she decided. “Me, turning into some kind of senseless romantic... High Ones above, I’ll be a pearl-diving limpet by the time I come home.” 

But it was a pleasant fantasy, and it kept her placing one foot in front of the other. 

As best as she could guess, she had been travelling for a hundred and thirty days when she came upon a new river, one flowing northward. She followed it faithfully for days, watching as it grew from a shallow streambed to a churning whitewater to a great wide river. 

“I need a new canoe,” she announced. 

She hadn’t the time or the strength to build a dugout. But the new trees, hard and unyielding as they were compared to the rainforest trees, had a supple bark that could be easily removed. 

“I’m going to make me a giant bark cup,” Savin decided, her eyes lighting up. 

She spent several days assembling the framework, then began to layer the bark. It took her a few tries to make the bark stick to the frame, for she was working with alien materials. But within an eight-of-days she had her bark cup. It was more of a trough, a crude little canoe that looked uglier than a troll. But it floated. 

A hastily-whittled paddle later, she was ready. 

It was nearly nightfall, and she was exhausted, but she found the strength to push the canoe into the water and climb in. The current bore it downstream gently. 

Savin laughed. “Show me something a pirate can’t do!” she shouted to the trees. 

She lay down on the bottom of the canoe. The stars were coming out overhead. A bright star she had never noticed from Green Moon Bay was high in the sky. It lay due north, and seemed to stand in the center of a great wheel of slowly rotating stars. 

“Hmm... you’re my guide,” she addressed the star sleepily. “My lodestar,” she added. “You’ll keep me on course, won’t you?” 

She closed her eyes and let the rocking motion of the canoe lull her to sleep. 

* * * 

Fifteen idyllic days on the river carried her north, out of the forest and into vast open plains. She slept under the stars every night, snuggly wrapped in her fur for warmth. The days were growing shorter now, and stars greeted her a little earlier each night. 

Finally the waterway she had dubbed the Northward River joined up with a great east-flowing river and her canoe became useless. She crossed the east-flowing river then continued north on foot once more. 

She now took to wearing her fur blanket as a wrap in the mornings and evenings. Several loops of her long belt about her shoulders held the wrap in place. 

A giant predatory cat not unlike the spotted lions of the south – but with a short stub of a tail – quarrelled with her one night. A brandished firebrand held it at bay, and Savin soon took to building larger fires at night. They reminded her of the seasonal festivals at the Bay, when bonfires were lit and bags of sparkpowder were set off to create fountains of light. 

Strange hooved beasts roamed the plains, each species with its own unique arrangement of antlers. Savin imagined they would taste good roasted over a fire, but she hadn’t the tools to bring one down, and contented herself to a diet of fish and small mammals. 

Her dreams were becoming more insistent. The disembodied voice called for her on a nightly basis. It seemed to her that she was getting closer. The echo of the cry was growing louder. Something told her that her journey was nearing a close. 

She saw how much the constellations had changed shape in the sky, and she marvelled at how far she had come. 

Who were these elves who lived so far north? Had explorers from the Islands really made it this far without turning back? Or were these elves even more distant kin – perhaps descendants of those who had remained in the Farland? 

What had happened to those who had stayed behind? The Islanders tried not to think of it. Mura the High One had led them across the deep water to escape the barbaric humans and cruel seasons of the Farland. What sort of creatures might have survived in that wilderness? Degenerate elves, as far removed from the Islanders as the Farland humans were from the friendly ones at Crest Point? It was a chilling thought. Yet the elves who had cried out for aid seemed as wholly elfin as any Islander. 

“Who are you?” Savin asked the voice in her head. “What will I find when I reach you?” 

But the voice had no answer. It simply called to her, an unending refrain. 

_Where are you, Nimh?_

“You’re not real,” she announced to the voice one night. “Your kin are real, but you’re not. How could you be, know my name? No, you’re just a figment.” 

_I’m waiting for you..._

Her dreams were starting to scare her now in their intensity. 

“I won’t listen to you.” 

_Answer me, Nimh!_

“No! I won’t answer fantasies.” 

* * * 

She awoke one morning, chilled to the bone, and saw a prickly white powder coating the ground in place of dew. She touched the powder. It was cold to the touch, and quickly turned to water against the warmth of her fingertips. 

“By all the High Ones,” Savin whispered. 

The frost melted away by midmorning, but Savin was filled with unease as she continued north. How much colder could it get? What if the wet season brought cold hard-water instead of warm rain? How would she survive with what little she carried? 

_We’re waiting for you, Savin._

The voices were a constant buzz in her head, a chorus of pleas and entreaties. And leading the song was the figment that would not be denied, the shadowy figure with glowing eyes and rum-sweet voice. 

“I’m not listening to you,” she moaned. Was she truly going mad now? 

The cry called to her night and day. She knew she could not be far now. 

She left the plains and returned to forested hillsides. Another moon-dance passed as she awoke to colder frost each morning and trekked through dappled woods. 

At night she heard the distant howl of forest beasts – not the sharp hoots and hollers of apes, but a long melodic howl. At first she heard only one note. Slowly, as the night passed and the howl grew louder, she could heard a myriad of harmonies. Each creature sang a different note. 

The trees were changing colour. Green leaves began to shrivel and turn golden, then bright red. It was certainly a more colourful sort of death than rainforest leaves, which simply turned brown and fell to the ground. She thought it beautiful at first, but when entire groves of trees turned orange and red she was terrified. What manner of death was sweeping the forest? Was this why the foreign elves were crying out for help? 

She used to talk and laugh to break the silence. Now she feared to. Now she only spoke to the voices in her head in tense mumbles. 

* * * 

A large dog, taller and more heavily furred than the canids of the rainforest, stared Savin down. She stared back, willing the animal to turn away. Elves always triumphed in staring contests with the dun-coloured dogs they kept on the Islands. But this dog refused to look away. Savin felt beads of sweat dot her brow. Now the beast was assuming an aggressive posture. 

Savin licked her lips. “Hello, there,” she attempted in a sweet voice. 

The dog’s tail shot up, and its mouth hung open in a friendly grin. It began to pad towards her, apparently in greeting, and Savin willed herself not to reach for the sword strapped to her back. Animals respected strength, and attacked weakness. She could not show fear. 

“Dogs aren’t so scary...” she murmured. 

But she had never seen a dog this big before, almost the size of a spotted lion. 

She heard that elusive howl in the distance. The dog’s ears shot up. Then it tipped its head back and howled in reply. 

“So you’re what makes that song, huh?” Savin said. “Funny... I would have pegged it for some kind of monkey.” 

The furred dog turned and loped down a game trail. Soon its silvery form was lost in the shadows. 

* * * 

She was nearly there. She could feel it. The voices in her head were shouting, spurring her to go faster. Her measured hike became a jog, her jog became a sprint. 

_Where are you? We’re waiting for you, Savin. Where are you? Answer! Answer!_

_Nimh... where are you?_

It was dusk, but she could not rest. The clamouring in her mind grew louder each time she stopped for breath. Static buzzed in her ears, as during the prelude to a hurricane. She ran on through the night. Her breath congealed in the air before her face, but she was too driven to notice. 

She tripped over a root, fell, rolled into a ball to protect her limbs, then got to her feet and ran on. She ran for hours as the moons rose and set. It was nearly dawn before exhaustion overtook her. Finally even the voices were too tired to pester her. She did not even bother to unpack her rucksack and build a shelter, but simply lay down on the driest patch of moss, using her bag as a pillow. She slept long, her dreams plagued by whispers and hisses. 

It was late afternoon when she finally awoke. She was achy and miserable. And the voices were still hissing in her ears. 

Her fur shawl was covered in cold sweat, and she stripped it off angrily, then lashed her long leather belt about her torso again. She was starving, and half-numb with thirst. She drained what remained in her waterskin, then struggled to her feet. She needed to find a watercourse. 

She abandoned her supplies in camp and staggered through the thick brush that crowded around the base of the hardwoods and evergreens. A rich scent of sap hung in the air. At least the needle-leaf trees that grew in sharp triangles did not seem to be affected by the red blight. 

_Savin..._

_Where are you?_

_We need aid..._

_Nimh? I’m waiting for you._

Her hands rose to her temples. She stumbled through the underbrush like a drunkard, chasing the whispers. 

_Ahh... Glimmeroot.... This is what... needs..._

_We need you, Savin..._

_Skywise – we found some. Where did he go? Skywise, are you there?_

_Are you there, Savin?_

_We need you..._

“No more,” Savin groaned. “No more.” She closed her eyes tight as she blundered through a clutch of ferns. 

Her foot struck a loose rock. She realized she had just walked herself off the edge of an embankment a split second before she hit the ground. 

She tucked herself into a protective ball as she rolled down the hill. She crashed through a berry bush and collapsed on top of something warm and yielding. In her delirium, she could almost swear she had collided with another elf. 

“Ohh...” she moaned. “High Ones above!” she rubbed her sore head, then threw her curtain of auburn hair from her face. “What in the name of–” 

She found herself staring into the eyes of an elf – glowing silver eyes like the stars she had followed north. She tried to draw back, to better take in the rest of his handsome face. But his gaze pinned her. 

The voices in her head had fallen silent. 

The elf licked his lips nervously. “Nimh?” he stammered. 

Her heart seemed to stop for an entire beat. It was the voice of her dreams, the rum-sweet voice she had taken for madness. 

The faceless voice, matched with a face at last. 

And a name... 

**Fahr...** she replied. She swallowed the lump that had built in her throat. Her trembling hands rose to frame his face. Was it only a dream? No, the flesh under her fingertips as as real and warm as hers. “I...” she stammered. “You’re... oh, you’re beautiful...” 

He touched her cheek in turn, the lightest caress, and Savin leaned into the embrace. 

**Nimh,** he sent again, and she almost swooned at the sound. 

**I found you. I knew I’d find you.**

**Author's Note:**

> Check out the full EQ Alternaverse http://www.janesenese.com/swiftverse


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